Looking back on why The Walt Disney Company decided to restore the New Amsterdam Theater in NYC

An estimated 1.5 million people made their way to Times
Square last week to experience Super Bowl
Boulevard. In fact, so many folks crowded into
this 13-block area that they sometimes had to wait for hours before they could
then zoom down that 60-foot long toboggan run on 40th
Street or shuffle through that tent where the
Vince Lombardi Trophy was on display.

Mind you, it's doubtful that this many football fans would
have made their way to "The Crossroads of the World" if this section
of New York City had remained just
as it was back in the 1970s & 1980s.

How bad was this part of NYC back then? Mario Cuomo, the
then-governor of New York State,
once described Times Square & 42nd
Street as ...

" ... a sewer and everybody knew it, right in the heart
of New York City. Now we're going
to get rid of all that filth and 42nd Street
is going to come back. People are going to bring their kids in here. Can you
imagine? It's the beginning of a whole new era for the City."

42nd Street back in the 1970s

Cuomo happily gave this quote at a press conference which
was held at New York City
Hall on February
2, 1994. Which was when The Walt Disney Company revealed its plans
to rehabilitate and then re-open the landmark New Amsterdam Theatre on 42nd
Street. Which -- City officials hoped -- would
then kick-start their long-delayed plans to revitalize this portion of Midtown.

And who was the man that actually put this plan in action?
The-Disney CEO Michael Eisner. Who -- to be completely honest here -- wasn't
initially all that enthusiastic about the Mouse getting involved in this
Extreme Makeover. Especially given that -- back in the late 1980s / early 1990s
-- the Times Square & 42nd
Street area had one of the highest crime rates in Manhattan.

As Frank Rose recounted in his June 1996 story for
"Fortune" magazine, it was postmodern architect Robert Stern who
initially reached out back in 1987. Which was ...

The worry -- back in the mid-1980s -- was thatTimes Square & 42nd Street would eventuallybe permanently in shadow thanks to a never-ending series of concrete towers like the 800foot-tall Marriott Marquis Hotel.

... when Times Square seemed about to
be paved with enormous office towers. Stern was commissioned to figure out what
to do with the theaters that lined 42nd Street.
Because of Eisner's close ties to the city -- he grew up on Park
Avenue and started out as a page at NBC -- Disney emerged early on
as a candidate to help redevelop the block. But when Stern, who'd once designed
an East Side penthouse for Eisner's parents, mentioned
the street to Eisner, he was told to come back in ten years.

Now keep in mind that this was actually before Michael hired
Robert to design a wide variety of buildings for The Walt Disney Company. Among
them the Roy E. Disney - Feature Animation Building in Burbank, the Walt Disney
World Casting Center, Disney Boardwalk, the Yacht & Beach Club Resorts as
well as Celebration Health & the full build-out plan for Celebration, FL.
At that time, Stern was just another guy trying to get Eisner's attention at a
time when Disney's then-CEO was far too busy trying to get the Company back on
its feet to take on any outside projects.

Which isn't to say that people stop pestering Michael about
this project. The non-profit corporation which had been set up to find a way to
fix up this decrepit corner of Manhattan even went so far as to enlisted the
services of civic activist Marian Heiskell. Who had known Eisner since he was
4.

The New Amsterdam (left) and 42nd Street as it looked before Disney began itsrenovation / rehab of this corner of Midtown.

Sadly, Marian got no further with Michael than Robert had.
As Rose reported in his "Can Disney tame 42nd
Street" story, one evening when Heiskell was
...

... seated next to him at a dinner party at the Eisners'
house in Beverly Hills, she even
pulled out a map and said how wonderful it would be if Disney came to New
York. He demurred, although he did send a couple of
people to look at the block. "He was being polite," Heiskell says
now. "He had said all along that he didn't want to be involved in
cities."

So if that was Michael's attitude in the late 1980s / early
1990s, what changed? It was Disney's decision to get in the Broadway musical
business that finally forced Eisner to get involved in Manhattan's
revitalization efforts. But again not for the reasons that you might think.

Tom Bosley as Maurice, Heath Lamberts as Cogsworth and Gary Beachas Lumiere in the original Broadway production of Disney's "Beautyand the Beast." Copyright Disney Enterprises, Inc. All rights reserved

As James B. Stewart revealed in "DisneyWar: The Battle
for the Magic Kingdom"
(Simon & Shuster, February 205), when The Walt Disney Company began to get
serious about possibly bringing a stage version of its Academy Award-winning
film "Beauty and the Beast" to NYC ...

... negotiations with the Shubert Organization, which, along
with the Nederlander Group, owned nearly all the theaters on Broadway, (made it
very clear to Michael) that Disney needed to own its own theater if it hoped to
make money on Broadway.

(Which is why in March of 1993) Stern took Eisner, Jane and
his son Anders over to the (New Amsterdam) theater,
where they donned hard hats and carried flashlights. Water was leaking through
the roof, forming puddles; bird droppings were everywhere; crumbled plaster and
other debris was scattered all over the floor. Still, the potential grandeur of
the theater was evident. remnants of allegorical murals, friezes, and mosaics; Art
Nouveau architectural details.

What the interior of the New Amsterdam Theater lookedlike prior to its restoration & renovation. Copyright Disney Enterprises, Inc. All rights reserved

By the time they had finished the tour, the prospect of
salvaging a landmark theater and restoring its fabled grandeur had captured
Eisner's imagination. This was a project that would cast Eisner in the role of
Renaissance patron, not just another corporate CEO. As soon as he got on the
company plan that day, (Michael called the then-president of the Disney
Development Company, Peter) Rummell and told him to follow up. "This is
going to be much more expensive that you think," Rummel warned. "And
a lot of headaches."

There's another great quote from Peter Rummell about the New
Amsterdam redo that I just have to toss in here. As he continued
to try & dissuade Disney's then-CEO from taking on this project, Peter is
reported to have asked Michael ...

Have you ever rehabbed your kitchen? Just think about this
as a very, very big kitchen rehab."

The theater's lower lounge area was in serious need of repair. CopyrightDisney Enterprises, Inc. All rights reserved

So with that home improvement analogy rattling around inside
of his head, Eisner decided to find out just how expensive the restoration of
the New Amsterdam might actually be before he then fully
committed The Walt Disney Company to this project. So he had the folks in
charge of the Times Square & 42nd
Street Redevelopment Project to reach out Tishman
Realty & Construction and ask that firm to put together a preliminary cost
estimate for this proposed theater rehab.

Now for those of you who don't know: Disney and Tishman
Realty & Construction have quite the history. Tishman was the construction
firm that the Mouse hired in the late 1970s to turn 600 acres of swampland in Central
Florida into EPCOT Center.
Tishman Realty & Construction also built that 814-room Hilton down in WDW's
Hotel Plaza
area.

And as soon as Tishman came onboard the New Amsterdam
redo project ... Well, they immediately began pushing Disney to consider
expanding what they were looking to do in NYC. To be specific: partner up with
Tishman Realty & Construction to build a hotel-retail-entertainment complex at the northeast corner
of 42nd Street and Eighth
Avenue.

And to Eisner's way of thinking ... Well, taking on two
hugely ambitious / sure-to-be-expensive projects in the then-troubled Times
Square / 42nd Street
area actually made more sense then just restoring the New Amsterdam.
If only because it then gave the Company additional clout when it came time to
hammer out the final terms of Disney's deal with city officials.

And let me just stress here that -- if Disney & Tishman
had in fact gone forward with this project -- the $303 million
hotel-retail-entertainment complex that they were looking to build together at
the corner of 8th Avenue & 42nd Street would have really been something.
Down at street level facing out towards Times Square
would have been New York City's
version of DisneyQuest. Directly above that would have a Disney Vacation Club
which -- as part of the multi-day Manhattan
vacation packages that this resort was going to offer DVC members -- would have
made premium seats to Disney's Broadway shows available at discounted prices.

Before Disney could fully commit to this project, they did
seek assurances from city officials that -- before the restored New Amsterdam
theater as well as this proposed new
hotel-retail-entertainment complex would open -- the City of New York
would do everything that it could to eliminate all of the drug dealers &
prostitutes who were still using 42nd Street as their primary hangout.

During this phase of the negotiations, Michael Eisner
recalled a particularly chilling conversation with Rudolph Guiliani, the
then-Mayor of New York City.

I had a little concern about the adjacent nightlife, and he (Giuliani) looked me in the eye and he said, "It'll be gone," and I said, "Mr.
Mayor, you know there is the American Civil Liberties Union, and I mean,
they're just not gone." He said, "Look me in the eye." And I said, "What?" He
said, "Look me in the eye." I said, "Okay." He said, "They will be gone."
Scared me. I guess(ed) they were going to be gone. So that was that, and we
said yes.

But before Disney finally, officially said "Yes"
to the New Amsterdam redo, they did get the City &
State of New York to agree to some pretty spectacular financial terms. To be
specific: While the Mouse would put up $8 million of its own money to help with
the renovation of this 10 story-tall Art Nouveau theater, the rest of this
restoration's costs -- the remaining 75% -- would be covered by a series of
loans provided by the City & State at a 3% interest rate.

Mind you, in exchange for this $28 million infusion of cash,
the City & State of New York would then get an undisclosed share of the
profits from any show that was presented at the New Amsterdam.
And as for Disney ... Well, once work was completed in late 1996 / early 1997,
the Company would then wind up with a 99-year lease on the property. Where
Disney could then present stage productions in NYC without first having to
agree to give the Shubert Organization or the Nederlander Group a large chunk
of the proceeds.

But between this deal was first announced in February of
1994 and when the New Amsterdam officially re-opened in April of 1997, there
were a few bumps in the road. A few changes in course. And even though Tishman
& Disney did announce in May of 1995 that they would teaming up to build that
hotel-retail-entertainment complex at the corner of 8th Avenue & 42nd
Street, by April of 1996, the Mouse had changed its mind. Given that those DVC
Resorts which had been built away from WDW property (i.e., Vero
Beach, which opened in October of 1995, and Hilton
Head, which opened in March of 1996) had proven to be slow sellers, Disney was
now having second thoughts about building a Disney Vacation Club Resort right
in the heart of Manhattan. "We
have simply decided not to do time shares in urban settings," said David
L. Malmuth, executive vice president of the Disney Development Company, at that
time to explain away the Company's decision.

Now what's kind of ironic about all this is that --
according to friends of Michael Eisner that I've spoken with -- Disney's ex-CEO
now supposedly considers his decision to pull out of the
8th-Avenue-&-42nd-Street hotel-retail-entertainment complex to be one of
his biggest mistakes. But then again, hindsight is always 20 / 20.

Anyway ... All that matters for theater fans is that
"The House Beautiful" has now been restored. This historic structure
(both the interior & exterior of the New Amsterdam
were designated New York City
landmarks back in 1979) is once again staging the sorts of theatrical
spectaculars that would do Florenz Ziegfeld, Jr. proud.

And speaking of Flo ... Given that the Ziegfeld Follies was
famous for its skillful mix of beautiful women, elegant scenery as well as the
antics of great clowns & comics like W.C. Fields, Leon Errol, Ed Wynn,
Eddie Cantor, Fanny Brice and Will Rogers ... It's actually kind of fitting
that the very next show that Disney Theatrical
will be staging in this space is "Aladdin." This new musical comedy begins previewing at the New
Amsterdam on February 26th and -- if all goes according to plan --
opens on Broadway on March 20th.

By the way, if you enjoyed some of the New York-related
stories that I shared in today's blog post, then you may want to head on over
to the e.t.c. website. Where -- if you'll click on the walks link -- you'll
discover that I'll soon be leading two tours in the City that will touch on a
couple of places mentioned in today's articles. I'll also be sharing lots of
other stories about how the history of New York City
and The Walt Disney Company are interwined. So if you're headed to NYC in April
or May of this year, you may want to consider signing up to take part in one or
more of these walks.

Jonathan Freeman as Jafar and Don Darryl Rivera as Iago in Disney "Aladdin," the new musical comedy which will soon begin previews at the New AmsterdamTheater. Photo by Cylla Von Tiedemann. Copyright Disney Enterprises, Inc. All rights reserved

I already emailed e.t.c. for further information about the tour. This must be a Disney/NYC year what with D23 Destination D's "64-"65 World's Fair event and your walking tour. After all (to embellish on a Walt Disney quote), "We should always remember that it all started with a Mouse" at the Colony Theater in NYC.

pschnebs

5 Feb 2014 1:10 PM

You're killing me, Jim - I'd love to take your Disney walking tour in New York, but it doesn't look like that'll be in the cards for me financially this year. Hopefully, it'll do well enough that you'll offer it again in the future. (And hopefully, the tour also includes a subway ride to a certain location in Flushing, but I digress...)

Interesting stuff about the New Amsterdam and the proposed development project in Times Square - if I were with the Company, particularly the folks shelling out money for the Disney Store or a DVC person watching all those folks booking hotel rooms or timeshares through an exchange, I'd be kicking Michael for not following through on the complex, too.

As far as the seediness of the old Times Square, that was waaayy before my time. If you go to the free Times Square Museum - right across the street from the TKTS booth, IIRC - they have an exhibit on the old peep shows, including an example of a peep show booth (sans adult entertainment, of course). It was... interesting, to say the least.

I wish I could go on this tour too. I would love to hear Jim speak in person. That would have been an incredible project if Disney had built the DisneyQuest and the hotel right there. They could have had a mini resort, right in the city. Maybe they will do that in the future. There are some NYC based Disney films (Rescuers is partly in NYC, Oliver & Company, Newsies)...they could have some fun with theming things to that. Maybe even come up with a new animated film set in NY. They could do a Princess movie there easily, with a Princess in town for a UN event or something and a fairytale is reimagined in more modern times (maybe with a Spanish princess since everyone is all about Spanish things right now).

Michael Goldberg

13 Feb 2014 4:49 PM

The gentleman's name was Florenz Ziegfeld, Jr., not Florence! Very interesting!